The Guardian, ANI, India Today Share 2019 Photo As Recent Blast In Kabul

Several news outlets including The Guardian, India Today, wire agency Asian News International (ANI), Zee Salaam, Hindustan Times published a 2019 photo of a blast in Kabul with the false claim that it shows visuals from the recent August 17, 2022 blast in Afghanistan's capital.

BOOM found that the photo is from July 2019 when Taliban carried out a suicide bombing at a building in Kabul, Afghanistan followed by a gunfight.

A huge explosion rocked Afghanistan's capital inside a mosque on August 17, 2022 during evening prayers. A Taliban intelligence officer was quoted by Reuters as saying that the blast happened in Khair Khana area of Kabul. Kabul police said that 21 people lost their lives due to the blast.

In a story about the blast, UK based publication, The Guardian published the image with a caption, "A Taliban intelligence officer said the explosion occurred in a mosque in the Khair Khana area of Kabul. Photograph: Twitter".

Wire agency ANI tweeted the same image as visuals from the recent blast and filed a copy carrying the image attributing it to an 'Afghan' twitter user.

Meanwhile, India Today carried the same image as part of their ground report from the blast. The same picture was used on their show where a reporter can be heard at the 1:22 minute mark saying, "We were the only channel present on the spot when this blast took place in a mosque."

The Times Of India, Hindustan Times, Zee Salaam, Organiser Weekly too published the viral picture in their report about the recent blast.

The photo is also circulating on Facebook.

Fact Check

BOOM first ran a reverse image search on the image and found a Vox article with the same image published on July 1, 2019 with the caption, "Smoke rises from the scene of a bombing in Kabul, Afghanistan, on July 1, 2019."

The Vox article credited the image to Getty, a photo wire agency and a keyword search, led us to the same photo published on Getty Images' website.

The photo on Getty was credited to photojournalist Haroon Sabawoon for Turkish wire agency Anadolu. The photo was uploaded in 2019 with the caption, "Smoke rises from the scene of a suicide bombing in Kabul, Afghanistan, July 01, 2019. At least 10 people were killed and 65 more injured in a suicide bombing, followed by gunfight at a Defense Ministrys installation in the Afghan capital Kabul on Monday, officials and local media confirmed."

We then looked for news reports about the 2019 blast and found news stories from July 1, 2019 that said the Taliban targeted several buildings in Kabul incuding a defence ministry compound. The New York Times described the attack as, "a complex Taliban attack including a car-bombing and militant assault" which "killed at least 40 people in Kabul on Monday, badly damaging a private war museum, an adjoining television station and a primary school, hurting dozens of children..."

A Reuters story published on July 1, 2019, reported a statement by the Taliban about the blast where the terrorist group said, it was "...targeting the defence ministry compound in Kabul." The report further said, "the blast injured several Taliban fighters, civilians and government employees."

We then checked for details from the recent, August 17, 2022 blast in Kabul and found that the blast happened inside a mosque. Pictures of the bombed mosque were uploaded by wire agency The Associated Press' on their site.

We noticed that none of the recent visuals matched the the viral picture. A Reuters report about the incident can be seen below.